Varda unveiled the Arc Pro at Autumn Showfloor 2026, a premium wireless controller aimed at PC players and owners of handheld gaming PCs. It costs $119.99, launches November 18, and is available to preorder now. Varda says it will work with any PC over its included 2.4GHz dongle or Bluetooth, and that it has been tested specifically with the Pocketforge X.
The headline feature is the stick design. Each thumbstick sits in a magnetic module that pops out with a fingernail and clicks back in without tools. The Arc Pro ships with Hall-effect modules, which use magnets rather than physical contacts and so should not develop drift over time, and Varda will sell alternative modules with shorter or taller shafts and different tension springs for $19.99 a pair.
- Four remappable back buttons, two more than Varda’s current Strata controller.
- Two-stage trigger stops that cut travel to a short click for shooters.
- 1,000Hz polling over the dongle and USB-C, 250Hz over Bluetooth.
- A rated 30 hours of battery life with lighting off.
- Onboard memory for three profiles, switchable with a button on the back.
I spent about twenty minutes with the Arc Pro on the show floor, mostly playing Velocity Unbound on a Pocketforge X. The controller is slightly heavier than the Strata but better balanced, and the back buttons are easier to tell apart by touch than on most pads I have used. The trigger stops are firm and do not rattle. I could not test battery life or wireless latency in a meaningful way at the booth, and will do so in a full review.
We kept hearing from people who threw out an otherwise perfect controller because one stick started drifting. With the Arc Pro, you replace the stick, not the controller.
Felix Amundsen, head of product at Varda, at the Autumn Showfloor booth
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